Category: gaining innovation momentum

Innovation Convention 2011, EU organised, Brussels

The European Commissions Innovation Convention 2011

I was planning to go to this convention held in Brussel over December 5th & 6th, 2011, but eventually was forced to stay back in the office to complete some work for different projects I’m working on.

Thankfully the main conference was online so I was able to follow it, even if a little selectively.

I’m sure you agree on conferences or in this case, a convention, are often ‘variable feasts.’ You never find everything appealing or valuable to you, but even at a distance, I did find plenty of interesting areas in those I was able to watch.

I hope they make many of the sessions freely available post-convention as they have much to draw ‘inspiration and understanding’ from for all of us.

I’m not planning this as a detailed report of the convention but to reflect  and comment about why I think it provided a good contribution to the innovation debate(s), especially here in Europe.

We do need to ‘tune in’ more on what these events can offer, if managed well, in-depth and breadth of innovation’s scope. I’m singling out some of the more striking moments for me. Continue reading “Innovation Convention 2011, EU organised, Brussels”

Aware, Exploit and Sustain Innovation Framework

I have a secret confession to make, I collect innovation frameworks, there I’ve admitted to it, and feel just that little bit better that one of my innovation secrets is out.

This collection has built up over eight or so years and I have certainly seen some really excellent ones but also some seem pretty thin, those “oh dear” moments!

I suppose I collect these a little like collecting pictures; some rare, some new, some promising but you can recognize and appreciate each for expressing that often difficult task of encapsulating innovation in any organizing framework.  Sometimes it simply boils down to each to their own, as long as it does the job, then fine.

Although I’m always curious to see how these seemingly can differ so much. Many I’m just convinced don’t go underneath the initial organizing framework top picture and I feel that is wrong. Some just seem to skate on innovation ‘thin’ ice.

I’ve used one over a number of years that I feel builds innovation systematically.
 Continue reading “Aware, Exploit and Sustain Innovation Framework”

The Innovating Power of Eight Words

Lately eight words have come up more often than not as the new imperative for business, not just for the start up but the more established business to measure themselves against.

We live in ‘volatile’ times and they reflect what we have to constantly remind ourselves to do and they just are keeping me buzzing at present.

These are: Adapt, Investigate, Agility, Speed, Scale, Impact, Experiment, and Execute.

Here is my take on the power of these eight words that need to be in our innovating lexicon Continue reading “The Innovating Power of Eight Words”

Building an Integrated Innovation Capability Framework

My real area of dedicated focus and wish to achieve, is in supporting organizations, teams or even the individual, to really build their integrated capability and capacity to innovate as a connected framework.

The critical design is of three mutually supporting capability building platforms do need to be put into place.

Within an organizational setting, you need to have in place three supporting capability building platforms; organizational supporting, knowledge and competency gathering, and a clear innovation process to channel new capacity through as final products or new services. All three need to be in place and integrated.

If you have these three platforms in place you can begin to move from more of an ad hoc set of capabilities through to a more integrated, synergistic and unique innovation capability framework to grow from. Continue reading “Building an Integrated Innovation Capability Framework”

What’s hot and what not in Innovation currently?

So what is hot, what is not in innovation at present? Any thoughts?
What do we need to remind ourselves about as we go about our ‘daily’ innovation business?

Some of my top of the mind quick thoughts:

  • Innovation is not the preserve of the (selected) few but the domain of the community. Driving this message home yields a real upsurge of new, often exciting activities that you would have missed out upon without engaging the broader community.
  • This absolute growing need to move on from the reliance of symbolic projects to justify innovations’ existence. Stop dipping your toe in the water, just jump in and get wet. Get everyone involved and want to contribute.

Continue reading “What’s hot and what not in Innovation currently?”

Plan your innovation resolutions early for 2012

For many October is the peak month for bringing together their strategic and operating plans for 2012. Meetings get frantic, issues get raised, and plans get drawn up, rejected and redrawn. The period becomes a fever pitch.

Where does innovation figure within this? In new products, new services and plenty of noble entreaties to adding to the growth I am sure. One aspect you might want to consider within all this activity and planning is to develop a resolution list of issues that need resolving.

I mean really, finally, actually resolving in 2012, to allow innovation to have a greater ‘hold’ on future thinking. Achieving a consensus, a clear focus, and a corporate commitment is what strategic plans are about so draw up your list of innovation resolutions needed to be resolved in 2012 and commit to them within the plans. Be upfront and bold.

Make sure you choose ‘soft’ as well as ‘hard’ innovation resolutions within any mix

One thing I would recommend when you draw up your list. Most corporate executives find the ‘softer’ aspects of innovation harder to work through.

There is this certain ‘hard wiring’ that everything has to be clear, measurable and tucked away  in the accounts or ‘ticked off’ in each person’s mind.

Softer aspects of innovation often don’t conform to this orderly view of the world and it is addressing this inconsistency ‘head-on’ has great value. Continue reading “Plan your innovation resolutions early for 2012”

Declarations and Social Innovation

I always get nervous when declarations are made, this one was over two days in the middle of September, 2011 in Vienna a “Vienna Declaration” was made determining “the most needed social innovations and related research topics”
Maybe it is the way it has been written as a declaration but I’m left uncomfortable. When you read within the declaration document:

“the ‘deliberations’ took place on what could be done to strengthen the social sciences capacity to play a prolific role in conceptualising and research of social innovation, and thus favour desirable development of the globalised knowledge society. This led to the idea of a Vienna Declaration that should identify critical areas of social and scientific development, and state a number of equally important corresponding research topics”

The rationale behind the declaration states the Vienna Declaration is the first and immediate Core Deliverable of the Conference, created and established during the conference by joint efforts of all participants.

This makes me even more nervous, those that went decided to make a ‘universal’ declaration but OK, I can’t fully comment as it is difficult to see the whole context for this meeting. it remains unclear if it has a pivotal role or not within SIE in Europe, on behalf of the EU, on behalf of society within the EU? I’m left really not sure. Continue reading “Declarations and Social Innovation”

Preparing the secret sauce for innovation delivery.

The secret sauce required for innovation delivery sometimes can be hard to itemize but knowing the ingredients and constantly improving on them wil make your ‘sauce’ stand out from others.

For many, it seems, execution or final delivery of the innovation is simply not given enough attention inside many organizations and that needs to certainly change and not just left to chance or delegated out as the less important stage.

For me, clarifying and committing resources on the innovation delivery part is a critical task to get right. I’ve discussed that elsewhere, but if your final delivery is wrong then all your preparation and effort simply ‘goes out the window.’

It is like a restaurant kitchen- correct delivery of the item makes or breaks all the hard work beforehand and if the final garnish or sauces are wrongly executed, the meal itself fails and leaves the customer dissatisfied, irrespective of the original efforts put in. Continue reading “Preparing the secret sauce for innovation delivery.”

Understanding innovation – the W L Gore way.

Once in a while, you have to stop and reflect. Why do I keep banging away at innovation, along with countless others?

Often I feel we are preaching to the converted, or the ones forced to listen just in case they miss something and are suddenly banished to hell, a non-innovating organization.

A place where no one will ever listen to them and this would have been the message to free the shackles and bring them back to innovation salvation.

So here I am standing in the innovation pulpit giving the weekly sermon on innovation beliefs and principles, offering this weekly reading on the (next) ten steps to avoid in that particular sin which we all know you are certainly committing!

Sometimes at the end of the sermon (or article), someone comes up and leaves an offering (comment) that sustains us a little more during the week, as we go about our business, in my case consulting, advising and researching on innovation.

What a hard life we seemingly lead!

So it is one of those rare occasions you recall something truly inspirational and this is what happened to me in going back to one of the best examples of true innovation practised and preached, the “W L Gore way”
Continue reading “Understanding innovation – the W L Gore way.”

Innovation as the means for Economic Evolution

It is suggested that economic growth is an outcome of the innovation trajectory we set. Today managing innovation is complex; often success is measured and valued by the creative destruction of others.

The ability to ‘evolve’ is very determinant on the knowledge base, either within a given economy or within a ‘federation’ to bring together as something new, offering more value than what is on offer today.

The combining of the dynamics within innovations parts

Innovation is highly dynamic in its constant change but also in its need of constant co-ordination of its parts.

I’ve been writing a lot recently on different issues that need thinking through for regaining a more sustaining innovation growth engine. Here I wanted to think out loud, about National issues that become more drags and not accelerators to innovation.

I then have tried to identify some of the reasons, and then finish with a personal reflection on the US versus European and some suggested actions needed for improving their innovation activity.

Often we forget to put our own innovation efforts into context, so I’d like to go up to the helicopter view here, maybe it helps us to relate better to some of the external barriers that need equal resolution, as we do often come up against these as we try to innovate within borders. Innovation cannot be contained, it needs harnessing but allowed to ‘move’ where it needs to go. Continue reading “Innovation as the means for Economic Evolution”